


The Templar

by darkladythief



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Dragon Age: Inquisition Spoilers, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Light Dom/sub, Slight Romance Arc AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-02 17:51:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 13,167
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2820974
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darkladythief/pseuds/darkladythief
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Someone tore a hole straight to the Fade, but it doesn’t feel like the end of the world.</p><p>Not until a templar smiles at her.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. in smiles, in laughter, in touches

**Author's Note:**

> This will become increasingly explicit. Part One is mostly tension. ;)
> 
> Updated notes: a few liberties may be taken with the relationship arc seen in the game and its relative timing.

The sky’s torn asunder and Evelyn Trevelyan can’t close her eyes without seeing the dead, and somehow it’s not the pulsing rift in the sky that drives home the truth. It's horrible, to be sure. It bathes her dreams in sickly green and throbs in her palm like a second heartbeat.

Someone tore a hole straight to the Fade, but it doesn’t feel like the end of the world.

Not until a templar smiles at her.

He’s the only one Evelyn can’t come to terms with. Leliana was the easiest—she’d accept anyone she could use, and the mark on Evelyn's hand makes her very useful. And Cassandra only cares about justice. As long as Evelyn is willing to help her restore whatever order she can, she’ll ignore that the help uses magic and power instead of a sword and shield.

But the templar—and no one can convince Evelyn he’s not still a templar when he walks like one, stands like one, _breathes_ like one—she sees _him_ in her restless dreams, too. Because he has power here, influence and a growing army and his own terrifying force of will, and templars don’t smile at mages.

Not the honorable templars, anyway.

* * *

Even worse, the man doesn't stick to harmless smiles.

Evelyn's world, already filled with demons and terrors, now holds an even more baffling horror--a templar who leans into her personal space to regard her with earnest respect, as if he can mask what he was and what he stands for behind the title of Commander.

She's known templars who hide their hatred. Back in the Circle there was one with a rakish scar bisecting one eyebrow and trailing down his cheek. He had beautiful blue eyes framed in thick black lashes and laughter like midnight—dark and seductive.

Whispers traveled from apprentice to apprentice, warning them not to trust his pretty eyes or his too-easy laughter, but some sheltered fools always think that whispers are unfair and people are more decent than gossip paints them.

Evelyn tries not to be a sheltered fool anymore.

But if there's hatred behind the Templar's smiles, she can't find it. And that's what she calls him now, in the silence of her mind… _the Templar_ , as if it's a title, as if she can build a wall between them by refusing to think his name. Especially when his smiles grow warmer, his eyes brightening when she steps into the war room, as if he's genuinely glad to see her.

He rests his gloved hands on the table and leans in to hear her reports, close enough that she can see the fine lines around his eyes, lines that deepen when he's giving her those absolutely-still-unwelcome smiles.

She tries to deflect. With short answers first, and then with dry sarcasm, but that was a mistake. The Templar's laughter isn't the darkness of midnight. It's a sweet spring morning, soft at first but getting warmer by the second, even when she makes _him_ the target of the sharpest side of her tongue.

In fact, if she didn't know better, she'd swear he _likes_ the sharpest side of her tongue.

* * *

And as if that isn't bad enough, he starts touching her.

It's probably not the first time. Surely she's touched him before—a handshake, or a brush of fingers. He's constantly shoving papers at her to sign, though less lately, now that she thinks about it. Josephine's been the one standing next to her, demanding the signature of the Herald of Andraste.

Maybe that's why she can't remember any particular touch. He's been avoiding touching her to the point that she can't remember until the first time she can't forget.

It's after a long trip to the Storm Coast, one where she comes back drenched and shivering and convinced she'll never, _ever_ feel dry again. She wants to crawl to her quarters and change, but the fact that she just recruited a mercenary crew—led by a Qunari spy—is something that shouldn't wait.

Cassandra and Leliana agree about not waiting. What they don't agree on is what to do about the new recruits, and freezing water drips from Evelyn's hair down the back of her neck while they debate the merits and risks and exactly what sorts of _reports_ will be winging their way north.

That damn drop of water keeps going, a trickle of ice down her spine, and she's hoping no one asks for her opinion because she's not sure she can give it without her teeth clattering together. That's a picture to inspire confidence—Andraste's chosen, blue-lipped and stammering because she doesn't have the wits to come in from the rain.

And that's when he touches her. Though it's not him, at first, but his cloak with the huge fur collar, and it's _warm_ when it settles around her shoulders. Warm from his body, she realizes, which means that the Templar generates the sort of heat that lingers, the sort she can feel through her sodden robes. And it's huge on her, enveloping her, forcing her to remember how intimidating he seemed the first time he loomed over her.

"You need to dry off," is all he says, but it's a low rumble, and his fingers curl around her upper arms as he says it. He rubs, slowly, trailing from her shoulders to her elbows and back up, as if he's going to rub warmth back into her numb limbs with his own two hands.

But he doesn't. He releases her, leaving her with his cloak and his warmth and the fur tickling her cheeks, and she's never been close enough to smell him, but that must be his scent clinging to it. It's as complicated as he is—hints of the oil the soldiers use on their swords, and the campfires they use to fight the bitter cold. And beneath that, incense, a scent that reminds of her of the Circle, and the chapel there.

The association should chill her, but it doesn't. Because the templar with the beautiful blue eyes and dark laughter and dangerous scar— _I got this trying to save a templar brother from an abomination_ , he'd whispered, not hiding his hatred so well anymore—he hadn't been the sort to visit the chapel and smell like incense. He hadn't been the sort to pray.

The honorable templars hadn't smiled at mages, but they'd done all those things. They'd had faith.

So does Cullen.

* * *

Evelyn was right about his name.

Once she thinks it, she doesn't stop thinking it. She tries to correct herself the next time they're bent over the war table. Cassandra and Leliana are talking to Josephine, hashing out the implications of allying with mages or templars, as if they have the influence to convince either to join forces with the rag-tag Inquisition.

Cullen— _the Templar_ —leans forward, his big fists braced on the surface of the table, his brow furrowed. He's not weighing in because everyone knows where he stands. With templars, because he was one, is one, will always be one.

That's what she tells herself, as she stares at him until magic crackles just under her skin. _The Templar, the Templar, the Templar._

She might as well call down lightning and put them all out of their misery, because when Cullen—Maker help her, he'll _always_ be Cullen now—looks up and crooks his lips upwards in the smile that seems to offer reassurance even though the set of his shoulders and the stress in his eyes proves he has burdens enough…

She doesn't see a templar.

He's a man. A man with honesty in his eyes, and she knows the difference now. Knows it from hard experience, knows it in her bones. Knows it so well that Blackwall's warm smiles make her feel skittish and wary, because he has beautiful eyes and seductive scars, too, but he also has secrets.

Of course, Blackwall doesn't want to want her. He just wants to take her, in ways she'd probably understand better if she _had_ spent more time listening to the apprentices whisper. Sometimes she's tempted to help Blackwall along in getting to the taking, but mostly out of curiosity. Or comfort. The nights might not be as chilly and endless with another body in her bed.

Ignoring a few secrets might be worth that. Blackwall's older. Experienced. If she has to fumble through it, she might as well pick a man who won't be fumbling with her. That's what she tells herself, anyway. That Cullen— _the Templar, blight it all_ —would fumble. Because he's honorable. And devout. And faithful.

_And warm._

Andraste's flaming sword, she's in trouble.

* * *

Once she starts thinking about fumbling, and experience, everything starts falling apart.

It startles her, the first time she realizes that Cullen's _older_. Maybe not as old as Blackwall, but those lines around his eyes aren't just from too much smiling. Cullen's lived more years than she has, and he's lived them harder.

He's seen pain. He's had power.

Maybe he's known love.

Not that he looks at her with the same appreciative lust that Blackwall can't seem to hide. Even Sera and Iron Bull flirt with her more readily. Cullen only seems interested in asking if she's slept, if she's eaten, if she's wounded, and if she's made up her mind to reach out to the Templars.

He's still touching her, though, and maybe that's why she keeps reading too much into it. She's catalogued his touches—fingertips on her forearm, to catch her attention. A squeeze of her shoulder to encourage. His big hand splayed low on her back when he's asking when her last decent night's sleep was.

Sera teases her about it once, after Cullen stops them on their way back from the Hinterlands to tell her to eat before meeting the war council. His hand lingers so long she swears she can feel the heat through her armor, but when he catches Sera staring he clears his throat and strides away.

Sera shakes her head as they head to the tavern. "Tosser can't decide, eh?"

At Evelyn's blank look, the elf makes a gesture so arcane—and vaguely obscene—that she doubts even the whispering apprentices could have provided context. "You know," Sera continues, making an even more alarming—and intriguing—gesture with one hand. "Whether he wants to…you don't know, do you?"

She doesn't. And Sera cackles and proceeds to explain. And demonstrate. With words, and then gestures, and then, while they're waiting for dinner, with a peach she snatches off someone else's table. Evelyn curses a too-active imagination and fights to control her expression, because the Inquisition doesn't need a blushing Herald.

Which is all for naught, because the next time Cullen catches her to ask if she's reconsidered allying with the templars, she has a hard time focusing on his words. She keeps seeing Sera and that flaming peach, and she's still not entirely sure understands, but some new, confused, desperate part of her wants to know whether Cullen does.

She barely hears a word he's saying, and has to fake agreement to cover the fact that she's wondering if Cullen would fumble, or if he would share Sera's experience, her enthusiasm for devouring soft, sweet things.

Just the thought scrambles her wits, which is probably why they end up marching for Therinfal Redoubt to solicit aid from templars— _templars,_ of all people.

Though considering Sera's feelings about mages, that might have been her plan all along.


	2. in nightmares and in dreams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It might be the first time he's said her name, and she never knew it could sound that way. Like a promise and a warning, rough to start and ending on a sigh.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the kind feedback! It's been a while since I felt inspired to fic, but Cullen wouldn't leave me be.

The templars have joined the Inquisition, and Evelyn misses the days when she was vexed by Cullen's smiles.

They were so tame. So harmless. How innocent she'd been before crawling through her own nightmares. How weak, to be scared of the pleasing shape of a man's mouth.

The first night back in Haven, she collapses into exhausted sleep only to wake with a scream stuck in her throat and the memory of Cullen's blood dripping through her fingers. Lies and nightmares, but they feel as real as they'd been with a demon sliding sick fingers through her thoughts, teasing and tugging at the ones that would hurt the most.

Cullen, with his throat slit. Cullen sinking a dagger into her back. Cullen angry, hateful, evil. Cullen imprisoned, tortured, betrayed.

Every time she closes her eyes, they come. Visions of pain and suffering, memories of the horrors she'd witnessed, and of new terrors she hadn't. Because her imagination has always been fertile, even when it's not about Cullen's lips and peaches.

She gives up on sleep just before dawn and resolves to become too tired for nightmares. There are still a hundred fires to put out—bandits at the Storm Coast, soldiers missing in the Fallow Mire. Even the Hinterlands need help from stray apostates battling ex-templars, so she gathers up the people least likely to question a day of hard riding and harder killing.

Except she's too tired to even get that right. Oh, Iron Bull is eager enough to sink his axe into skulls, and he banters cheerfully with Sera about a kitchen worker they've both got their eye on. But he's got that eye on her, too, and she can't believe she invited a Ben-Hassrath agent when she wants to be invisible.

At least he doesn't say anything. Neither does Varric. _He's_ watching her in a different manner entirely. Like he's trying to decide where she'll fit in the story he'll inevitably write about this. A tragic hero or a doomed martyr.

When the nightmares come again, and then grow worse, she begins to wonder if she'll survive long enough to be either.

* * *

Cullen finds her on hill behind the chantry, staring at the breach.

She starts to rise from her perch on an almost-comfortable rock, but he waves a hand and comes to stand next to her, the snow crunching beneath his heavy boots. It's barely dawn, but _daylight_ has a different meaning with the breach painting the hills the same sickly green she sees every time she closes her eyes.

He doesn't speak, and neither does she. Maker only knows what he's been told, and who's responsible. Cassandra, perhaps, who watches her like bear with one cub. Or Varric, who isn't above tweaking a story so he won't have to lie as much later. She doesn't think it was Iron Bull, though his loyalty to her might be outweighed by the gold the Inquisition is paying him to keep her in one piece.

"I would offer to speak to the apothecary," he says finally, still staring out at the breach. It should be impossibly far away, but it casts them both in an otherworldly hue and glints in his eyes. "But not being able to wake up is worse."

Simple words, but they hit her hard. For one second she's back in the mist and the fog, and this time it's Cullen dragging the dagger across her throat, sharp pain and hot blood and his breath against her ear in another man's dark laughter. _Too bad you'll never see me eat a peach_.

It hadn't happened that way, not at Therinfal Redoubt. But that's the thing about nightmares. They twist and grow and feed on themselves, and hers have fertile ground when her days are full of bloodshed and treachery.

She shakes free of the vision, just like she shook off sleep, and she can't hide her shudder at the idea of being trapped in that grim, twisted place. "I'll be fine," she lies, leaning precariously off the rock to pluck up a stray bit of elfroot. It's a good distraction—they _always_ need more elfroot—until she overbalances, and then Cullen's got his hands on her shoulders, steadying her.

More than steadying her. He's exerting pressure, just the tiniest bit, until her shoulder blades thump against his stomach and the back of her head collides with his chest. She's stiff at first, awkward and too aware of every point of contact. Not that any part of him is really touching any part of her—they're bundled against the cold in so many layers she might be leaning back against a rock.

But she's not. She's leaning back against Cullen, and his gloved hands are still on her shoulders, his thumbs making slow circles she can faintly feel. Soothing, like he's going to rub the tension and knots from her muscles, which is something that didn't appear anywhere in Sera's oh-so-thorough demonstration.

It's too bad. This is sort of nice. So nice Evelyn closes her eyes, and doesn't even startle when one of his thumbs slips above her collar to brush the nape of her neck. His gloves are supple leather today, cool and soft, and a different sort of sensation sweeps through her as he strokes up and down, up and down, so slow, so gentle, so…

"You'll stay here today," he murmurs, and it's not a suggestion from her counselor or advice from the Commander. It's a quiet, steely order, the kind he snaps out a hundred times a day, but for her he wraps it in velvet.

It provokes an odd flutter in her belly, one that joins the tingles and the shivery pleasure as his thumb grazes a sensitive spot just beneath her ear. And the words are so seductive she has to reject them, because if she puts down this burden for even a moment… "I can't. I need to solidify our base of power before—"

"No." He stills with the heels of his hands resting on her shoulders, his fingers spread wide as if to hold her in place and both thumbs resting at the nape of her neck.

Which is when she realizes how vulnerable she is, and how much she must trust him. It's not that he's a large man with his hands all but curled around her throat—one spell and even the largest man becomes an unmovable block of ice.

Unless he's a templar skilled at evading magic.

He could counter her spells. Drain her energy. She knows the feel of it, the claustrophobic pressure, the sick, twisting drag as her limbs get heavy and her brain reels toward panic. It's headed that way now, with her heart beating faster—

Except this isn't panic.

She wets suddenly dry lips, and her voice cracks on his name. "Cullen."

"You'll stay here today," he says again, but his voice is lower. Rougher. "We need you to close the breach. I--we need you…for many things, Evelyn."

It might be the first time he's said her name, and she never knew it could sound that way. Like a promise and a warning, rough to start and ending on a sigh.

Her cheeks flush, and she doesn't know why. Nothing about this seems in the least bit illicit. She hears five more provocative things out of Iron Bull by noon every day, and few of them have the power to make her blush anymore.

But he seems to take her silence for assent, because his thumbs are moving again, working up and down and driving that heat all through her body, until her brain melts and she blurts out the most ridiculous question. "Do you like peaches?"

Maker's breath, she can't believe she said that. But she still thinks she can pass it off as a curious question—it's odd enough to have fruit in the dead of winter, isn't it? Maybe she can tell him that the tavern's serving them somehow…

The laughter that pours over her is new. Not dark or light but _liquid_ , slipping under her skin to stroke and tease as his chest rumbles with it. "Not as much as Sera, I hear."

Of course he heard. No one gossips like soldiers, and Sera had a rapt audience by the end of—

Her brain catches up and she scrambles from the rock and out of his grip faster than Sera faced with magic. And she's braced for more laughter, but when she spins to face him, he's giving her a _look_ , one that answers three questions in the heartbeat before she turns to flee.

Cullen knows exactly what she asked—maybe better than she does.

Cullen wouldn't fumble. Not even a little.

Cullen likes peaches. Very much.

* * *

Evelyn crawls into bed and closes her eyes because she promised she would. And she's too embarrassed to brace for the nightmares, because maybe a little blood and carnage would stop her from replaying her humiliation over and over again.

_Do you like peaches?_

_Not as much as Sera._

Evelyn groans and buries her face in her pillow, but she's so exhausted even humiliation can't sustain her.

She dreams of Cullen. Of his hands, of his touch, of the way he was watching her in that fragile moment before courage failed her and she ran. Like she was seeing him for the first time, seeing past the stern Commander to some raw, starving creature trapped inside him.

He devours her, in her feverish dream. Pushes her to the bed and tells her she isn't leaving, tells her he _needs_ her, for so many things, in so many ways.

The ways he touches her are blurry, even in dreams, and already fading when she wakes. It doesn't matter though, that she's too sheltered to conjure explicit fantasies. She still wakes wet and aching and wondering if it's blasphemy for the Herald of Andraste to bury her face in her pillow to muffle the noises she makes when she slips her fingers between her thighs.

Not that she can stop herself. She's so primed, so needy, that she barely has to touch herself before she's shaking apart, and the illicitness of it—she's a mage and he is, was, a templar, and he's her _Commander—_ twists her up again, until she's summoning the memory of strong hands resting so close to her throat to help her come a second time.

She doesn't know how she'll look him in the eyes ever again, but the trade-off might be worth it. Because she collapses, limp-limbed and wrung out, and it's only moments before she's drifting back into peaceful, desperately needed sleep.

And this time, the dreams are sweet.


	3. in fire and ice, in song and heartache

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's the memories, the ones she's locked away. Memories of beautiful eyes and sheltered fools and all the reasons mages and templars don't mix because they come for you with knives and swords in the end, even if you're innocent.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The occasional liberty will be taken with the timeline of the romance as it played out in the game. All in the name of fun and wickedness. (Much wickedness.)

Closing the breach was supposed to fix the world. Instead, Evelyn's life dissolves into extremes.

Victory is swallowed by defeat. Flames give way to ice.

She'd wanted to escape the watching eyes of so many hopeful people and the crush of too many bodies crowding around her, but now she's trapped in solitude. She'd give anything to hear Sera's barking laughter or Varric's friendly teasing or even Josephine, chasing after her with one more treaty or offer or overture for her to consider or sign or reject.

She'd even welcome the dragon back. Or maybe not. Dying in flames would hurt more, and her body stopped hurting sometime before the wind shifted, driving snow directly into her numb face. It's bad that she doesn't hurt. She knows that, somewhere beneath the drowsy relief. Numbness is the enemy, but pain is so _exhausting_.

Her boot catches on a bit of ice, and she nearly pitches forward into the snow. Only her staff saves her, but her grip on it is slipping, too. She gives herself permission to stand and gasp freezing air through her cracked lips, each breath stabbing pain through her chest, as sharp as one of Cole's daggers.

It would be easier to stop. Stretch out on the snow. Let someone else be the hero of Varric's next tale.

Cullen would never forgive her.

Laughter shreds her lungs, and she doesn't have the air for more than a few heartbeats of it, but this is the wildest extreme of all. An apostate staggering toward a templar, desperate not to disappoint him by dying.

So she takes a step. And then another.

It's not until he's clutching her shivering body to his warm chest that she understands the truth. They're not living extremes—they _are_ extremes. The Mage and the Templar.

Ice and fire.

"Don't let go," she murmurs, squeezing her eyes shut as the world lurches back and forth. He doesn't answer, not with words, but his arms tighten and she knows something's changed.

No. _Everything's_ changed.

* * *

The singing makes everyone feel better. Everyone but Evelyn, who would rather fight a rage demon—naked, without a staff—than face one more wide-eyed pilgrim who falls to their knees, fist over their heart, and begs for her blessing.

She feels the weight of them now. It was different, before, when the whispers were just that—hushed and easily ignored. When she spent most of her time traveling far from Haven, tracking down allies and closing rifts.

When they hadn't belonged to her.

The soldiers had been Cullen's charges. The scouts belonged to Leliana. Cassandra ruled over Chantry recruits and administrators danced on Josephine's pleasure. Vivienne was there for power, Varric was chasing a story. Bull wanted gold and Blackwall wanted to be a hero. They'd all had reasons that had nothing to do with her.

She'd been a symbol. A figurehead. A tool.

Now she has to actually lead.

On the fourth night she escapes the tents and the soldiers and the faith and hope that shines from their eyes. She's their own private miracle. She's walked out of the Fade. She's walked out of death's grasp.

With such achievements to her name, walking out of the camp alone should be a simple enough task.

But of course it isn't.

She knows it's Cullen who's followed her without turning around. Because she recognizes the way his boots crunch on the snow, or the way his cloak whispers over his armor, or maybe she can just feel him along her skin. She's been hyperaware of him from the start, her fear bleeding into wary disbelief, twisting into reluctant affection, melting into baffled longing, and now…

"Are you here to sing for me again?" she asks, forcing her tone to lightness. He likes her humor, but it still builds a wall. He can't talk about real things, terrifying things, if she's making jokes.

He does something worse. He stops close enough that she really can feel him all along her back, and when he laughs she can feel that too, straight to her toes. "Only if you have a request."

There's one nice thing about dying and coming back to life—she's forgotten how to be embarrassed about something as mundane as sex."How about something bawdy."

"Bawdy, hmm?" His hands settle on her hips, and he's touching her but not really. His gloves and her cloak and her armor form a barrier, and it's still so potent that she thinks she'll go up in flames if his skin ever grazes hers. "As the Commander of the Inquisition, I shouldn't admit to knowing anything of the sort."

His voice is getting lower again, because the things they're _really_ saying now can't be spoken aloud. Their banter is a cover for the way he's touching her and the way she's letting him. "That’s a pity," she teases. "I'll have to ask Sera, I suppose."

"Oh, I'm sure she'd oblige," he mutters, and _low_ has turned to _dark_ , and if she didn't know better—or maybe she doesn't—she'd think that rough edge was _disapproving_ or something else, something that makes joy bubble up as his fingers tighten possessively on her hips.

Cullen is jealous.

Not over the Herald of Andraste or a symbol or a miracle. Over _her_ , a woman of flesh-and-blood, and it's so personal, so _intimate_ that she wants to roll in it and wrap it around herself like a shield against the worshipful, trusting gazes of the devoted.

She needs more. So she laughs and tilts her head back, trying to catch a glimpse of his stern profile in the darkness. "It's the one topic where she's always obliging."

His chest rumbles behind her, and though the noise is mostly stolen by the wind, she thinks the staid, severe Commander actually growled.

She thinks.

It's only reasonable to be sure, so she tries again. "Or I could ask Iron Bull. Drinking with the Chargers would probably teach me more than I want to know about—"

" _Evelyn._ "

Oh yes, that's a growl, laced with warning this time, and she cheerfully ignores it. "You're the one who doesn't want to be inapprop—"

One gloved hand catches her chin, tilting it up and back. For one dizzy moment she thinks he's snapped, that he's going to kiss her, and her heart's still hammering when he presses his forehead to her temple instead. His mouth hovers over her ear, his breath hot against skin chilled by the frigid night air.

"Don't confuse my duty with my desires."

It's her turn to make an inarticulate sound. It's mostly a sigh until he slides his other hand around to her middle and tugs just enough to bring her flush against him. Touching from head to toe and still barely at all, until she cranes her head in his grasp enough for his lips to brush her ear.

She was wrong. Not flames, but electricity. That's what his mouth feels like on her skin, like the first time she got on the wrong side of someone else's magic. A jolt, her body rioting, her brain spinning.

Gasping in icy air only helps so much. She whispers his name, and she even sounds dazed. Dazed and more nervous than she wants to, but there's fighting enemies and killing demons, and then there's _this_.

His touch gentles, his thumb skating along her jaw. "I won't hurt you. Tell me you know that."

That's when she realizes she's tense. So tense, trembling in his grasp, and it's not the ice or the fire. It's the memories, the ones she's locked away. Memories of beautiful eyes and sheltered fools and all the reasons mages and templars don't mix because they come for you with knives and swords in the end, even if you're innocent.

Cullen was in Kirkwall. And before that, Kinloch Hold, during the last blight. He's seen mages turn bad and templars turn bad. He knows all the reasons better than she ever could.

And his lips are still touching her. "Evelyn…"

"I know," she says quickly. Too quickly to sound sincere, even though she wants to be.

"It's all right." His hands fall away, from her chin first, and then her body, leaving her bereft and aching, even though his breath still tickles over her cheek. "When you're ready."

"Cullen--"

"When you're ready," he repeats, more firmly this time. His lips graze her temple in what almost feels like a kiss, and then he's turning away. "Try to get some sleep. We have a long walk ahead of us."


	4. in her power, in his control

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That's what Cullen needs, she's learned. Control of the situation, of the moment. Maybe it's something in his past, some torment he suffered at the hands of abominations, or maybe he just likes it. But she can feel the difference in him, the steadiness that comes when he knows he's responsible for every touch that passes between them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You know stuff has gotten serious when I'm writing on Christmas Eve. ;) Thank you so much for all the kind comments. I'm really hoping to finish this off quickly before I have to go back to my day job in January, so I won't leave you guys hanging for long.
> 
> (We've almost come to the end of the UST ride. Beware. Also the playing with the romance arc will probably continue.)

Cullen wasn't lying about the long walk.

She undertakes it with a fluttering in her chest made worse by the fact that Cullen has transformed into Commander Cullen, a man determined to pretend that he'd never touched her under the moonlight. He smiles at her. He advises her. But he doesn't quite meet her eyes. And when she walks into the darkness as the camp grows quiet, he doesn't follow.

Maybe he's simply trying to give her space to catch her balance. The Maker knows she needs it, because in the space of a day everything changes. Solas gives her a castle. Leliana gives her a sword. Cassandra gives her a mission and a new title—Inquisitor.

Because _Herald_ didn't sit heavily enough.

Everything changes, and nothing does. There are still too many places she needs to be and too many allies she needs to impress. Even if she wanted to track down Cullen, there simply isn't _time_ , except for around the war table that appears on the third day, where everything is business and strategy and precious hours slipping from between their fingers.

At least her castle is more beautiful every time she turns around. A throne appears, and a wine cellar—the latter no doubt thanks to Dorian, who seems unimpressed with the tavern that's sprung up. She comes back from a long mission to find herself in possession of a grand bedroom with a breath-taking view and a luxury she hadn't realized she'd missed—her own private bath tub.

She spends half the day in it after returning from the Hissing Waste, convinced she'll never be free of the sand that blows vertically and gets _everywhere_. With her hair still damp and let loose around her shoulders for once, she wanders the castle and gets thoroughly, wonderfully lost.

It's in the basement that she finds it. A library nowhere near as well appointed—or decorated—as the one Dorian is busily creating, but with fascinating books that look ancient. They line shelf after shelf of a narrow hallway leading to the real prize: a room of floor to ceiling bookshelves stacked with volumes on every subject.

And it's private. Abandoned. _Hers._

At least something still is.

* * *

She wastes part of the afternoon cleaning away the cobwebs and straightening the table and chairs before dragging down a huge tome that looks promising, and her heart beats faster as she opens the leather cover and traces her fingertips over one crinkled page.

She missed this with an ache she hadn't realized. Books and study, chasing knowledge through dusty history and learning for the joy of knowing, instead of racing to keep lives from slipping between her fingers.

They could be slipping away now. It's indulgent to curl up in the chair with the book in her lap, but she needs this. Her stolen moment, her chance to be selfish and human and flawed. And the book _is_ fascinating. She's so engrossed that she nearly leaps out of her skin when she hears the soft _click_ of the door at the far end of the hallway, followed by a familiar voice. "Inquisitor."

Yes, that's who she is to him now. That's all she is to anyone.

Evelyn closes the book and drops it on the table before Cullen reaches her, because he can't have this part of her. Not when he's holding back so much of himself. She greets him on her feet, tugging her tunic into place and lifting her chin. "Commander?"

They stare at each other, and it's different. He's not wearing his armor. She's not wearing hers. She should feel naked with so little fabric to protect her, but there have never been more layers between them. They're just not the kind you can see.

He's not even meeting her eyes. His gaze is fixed lower, on her chin or her neck or her ear, and she hopes he's remembering how he touched her there and woke her body, and then walked away because she wasn't…whole enough. Easy enough.

 _When you're ready_ , as if she's a pie that hadn't finished baking, and he can abandon her and only return for the sweet part.

It sparks anger—wonderful, soothing anger—and that's better than any armor. "Did you need something, Commander?"

She means to cut with her voice, but he doesn't flinch. He still seems enviously stoic until he raises his eyes and gives her a glimpse of what's building there with all the violence of a storm about to break.

Even sheltered and inexperienced, she can make a list of the things Commander Cullen currently needs.

For her to strip away his clothing.

For her to strip away _her_ clothing.

For her to part her lips and let him claim them. For her to part her thighs and let him—

"Yes," he rasps, as if she's spoken every word out loud. "You can see it, can't you?"

Anyone could see it. And that must be why he won't look at her, why he avoids her. If she can read such lecherous intentions in his eyes, what would someone like Bull or Blackwall find there? Her cheeks heat at the idea…

Though now she's curious what they'd say.

She parts her lips, but there isn't a chance to speak because he's touching her, sliding his bare fingers through her loose hair to cradle the back of her head. "I forget how young you are," he says more softly, stepping closer. "You're so strong. So indomitable. We've heaped more on you than any ten people should be called upon to endure, and you just stand taller and fight harder."

Because fighting is easy. As much as she misses the books, in her heart she knows she would have been wasted on such passive pursuits. There's a clarity in battle that she can't put into words, a peace that comes from being so fully in the moment that nothing else exists.

Just like when Cullen touches her.

"The fighting isn't bad," she admits, because anger has abandoned her, and she can't rid herself of the desire to please this man. "It's the faith that's hard. Not mine. Theirs."

"You give them faith." His fingers tighten, tugging gently at her hair, setting off a prickling in her scalp that slides down her spine. "You give _me_ faith."

Which is the entire problem. "And if I fail?" Her death would be a mercy at that point. Better than coming back to realize she'd destroyed the faith of thousands.

That she'd destroyed him.

"You won't," he says, fervent as only a man who needs to believe can be. And that's the realization that sets her heart to racing this time.

She could _destroy_ him.

This isn't the same as being in the Circle, making herself vulnerable in a place where she holds no power. She's the Inquisitor, the Herald, the people's hope, the face of the world's very salvation. She's so steeped in power it drips from her fingers.

If Cullen needs control to manage his fear or the nightmares of his past, she can give him that.

* * *

She could have kissed him in the library, but she doesn't. She doesn't kiss him for another week, and even then it's really _him_ kissing _her_ , quick and rough and flooding her with satisfaction as he presses her back against the stone balustrade.

That's what Cullen needs, she's learned. Control of the situation, of the moment. Maybe it's something in his past, some torment he suffered at the hands of abominations, or maybe he just likes it. But she can feel the difference in him, the steadiness that comes when he knows he's responsible for every touch that passes between them.

She can feel the difference in herself, too. She made terrible choices the last time, and it's a relief to place the burden on his shoulders. It's the one thing he can carry, and he was right about that—her own burdens are still multiplying, and she's not sure she can carry another.

The next time she leaves the war room, she lingers at the top of the staircase that leads to the basement until she's caught his eye. That's all she gives him—a look, and a smile—and then she's down the stairs and back in her library, and the rest is up to him.

Control. Giving it to him isn't just a relief. It's a game, even more thrilling than beating him at chess, and triumph floods her when she hears the tell-tale click that means he's joined her.

She plays it right to the end, studying the shelves with her back to the entrance, staring at spines she can't read because all of her focus is on tracking his near silent steps as he draws closer and closer. She covers a shiver by reaching up as if to grasp one book, and his bare hand wraps around her wrist, pressing her splayed hand to the shelf.

"You missed the last report," he rumbles, his lips close to her ear. The words don't make sense at first, because he must have discarded his armor. His chest is flush against her back, solid muscle and blazing heat, and for the first time his hips are snug against her ass.

Cullen likes being snug against her ass. A lot.

He's still silent, waiting, so she struggles to say something to make him keep touching her. "What report? The supplies?"

"Mmmm." Hot breath on the nape of her neck, and then he's _kissing_ her, lips parted, mouth brushing along her skin until he finds that spot below her ear that makes her moan, and then it's the teasing scrape of his teeth and the soothing swipe of his tongue.

Her knees are already weak, her breath coming quick and hard as he shifts his mouth back to her ear and chuckles. "I would have liked seeing your face when Josephine mentioned the peaches."

Cheeks flaming, she thumps her forehead against the shelf in front of her with a groan. "Can we forget that? Please?"

"No." His voice is warm and amused, and he presses a kiss to the spot where her neck meets her spine. "Sera was providing her credentials, my sweet, sheltered Inquisitor."

She likes being sweet. And _his_. It's the sheltered part that makes her bristle. "I'm not _that_ innocent. I understood." The theory, at least. And the fact that whatever Sera was doing was as much offer as instruction.

Maybe she sounds too upset, because Cullen eases back and urges her to face him. All hints of humor are gone from his face, and his hands have vanished from her body. He's gripping the shelves on either side of her head, as if he needs the reminder to not be touching her. "I know how it can be in the Circle," he says quietly, his eyes intent on her face. "Fast. Furtive. Worse."

 _Worse_. She wets her lips and closes her eyes, and this is the point where she gives him trust. It should be easy, with all that power people shower upon her at every turn, but this is the one thing that still makes her feel small.

Because she knows what he's imagining. Violence. Violation. Of course a hero would have had better judgment than to trustingly offer everything to a man who only wanted the triumph of conquest.

"Once," she says finally, blocking out the memory by focusing on keeping her voice steady. "Fast and furtive. It wasn't bad. Wasn't good, either. Just…a poor choice."

"Another mage?"

They both know the answer, she's sure of it. And she hates him a little for making her say it. But that's the point, she supposes. He can't _make_ her say anything. She can plant a hand on his chest and shove him away and stride from this room, and that will be the end of it.

Cullen only holds the power she gives him, and it's up to her to decide what that means.

* * *

In the end, she tells him the whole humiliating story. About the templar with the beautiful eyes and the scars and how she'd been warned. How the apprentices had whispered that he wasn't sincere. And how clever he'd been, making her feel as if she was so special that she'd changed everything, changed _him_.

She even tells him about the first time—the only time—and by that point he's sitting in her chair and she's in his lap, her head tucked against his shoulder as she bares the rawest part of her heart. Not that her only time was fast and uncomfortable and over before she could enjoy it, but that he'd laughed at her in the aftermath, shredding her fantasy of forbidden love with a gleeful cruelty that bordered on sadistic.

No wonder her new titles weigh so heavily. It's happening all over again, a thousand times worse. She's fallen for the story that she's special, the exception, the one who changes everything. Only this time instead of some mean-hearted boy, she's setting herself up as the chosen of Andraste herself.

If they find out she's not—if _she_ finds out she's not—the truth will shatter her.

Her voice is shaking by the end, shaking as hard as her faith, and Cullen slides a hand into her hair and twists it so tight her scalp burns. It jolts her out of her panic as he forces her to meet his eyes. His fierce, dangerous eyes.

"You're not special because you fell out of the Fade," he says, every word slow and precise. "You're special because of what you did next." His free hand grasps her wrist, his thumb swiping over the anchor on her palm, and she swears it pulses in response. "You're not special because of this. You're special because of what you do with it."

When he says it like that, it doesn't feel like a delusion or a fantasy. Just like fact, logical and indisputable, and it leeches away some of the shame. It's swiftly becoming the paradoxical truth of their relationship—the more control she gives Cullen, the more powerful he makes her feel.

And he's still controlling the pace, testing how much she'll offer. In this moment, with his hand twisted in her hair and her heart lighter than it's been in weeks, she knows she'll give him everything.

Soon.


	5. with pleasure and patience

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is how Cullen seems to like her best—flushed and needy and utterly at his mercy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand, here we go into the dirty. Merry Christmas! :)

Bull goes down protecting her from getting her head crashed in by giant throwing druffalo-sized boulders, and Evelyn's heart stops beating until she realizes the Qunari's heart _is_ beating.

It's still a close call, her closest yet. They're strapped for supplies and what they have at the camp isn't more than a temporary remedy. The huge mercenary tries to shrug it off with a joke, but Dorian's in a panic he won't acknowledge, because admitting it would require admitting things he isn't ready to face. It makes his tongue sharper than usual, and Evelyn's the only one he won't eviscerate.

It's like that more and more each day. Problems only she can solve. People only she can manage. Tiny errors in judgment that other people pay for in blood.

She accompanies them back to Skyhold because she owes it to Bull, and because she needs to check in with Leliana and Josephine. She tells herself that this time she'll steal an hour for Cullen, but the clamor for her attention starts before they've reached the courtyard.

So instead she gets the five minutes after she arrives in the war room and he's the only one there. She starts to smile, to greet him, but he's on her so fast she can't even gasp as he backs her up against the door and crushes his mouth to hers.

This is what they have. All they have, and sometimes she regrets telling him that her first time was fast and unsatisfying. He seems determined not to make the same mistake with her, even though she can't imagine _anything_ he'd do to her could leave her less than satisfied.

All he has to do is touch her, and her body heats. By the time he licks his way past her lips she's already wet, and the fear and pain of almost losing a friend slices deep, demanding an outlet in pleasure and passion.

She slides her fingers down his body, trying to figure out if she can undress him just enough to get him inside her, but he moves faster. He grips her wrist and drags it to the door above her head, and then catches the other one and does the same.

This is how Cullen seems to like her best—flushed and needy and utterly at his mercy.

"Not like this," he whispers against her lips. "Trust me?"

She does, without question, and he rewards her for it by working one hand beneath her clothes, his hand big and hot as it slides down her abdomen and lower. Her heart hammers as the world tilts dizzily, and she can't stop herself from going up on her toes to try to hurry him, because she needs this, she _needs_ it—

He laughs low and hot against her ear and shifts his fingers higher, teasingly out of reach. "Can you be quiet? Josephine could be in her office by now."

She nods her head frantically, even though it's a lie. She thinks they both know it, and that he likes it. The idea that they might be discovered. The idea that he might have to silence her.

And he does, almost the moment his blunt fingertips glide across that sensitive spot. She's wanted it for so long and needed it so much that her head falls back against the door with an unsubtle _thud_ , but even that's not as loud as her moan.

He abandons her wrists and folds his fingers across her mouth instead. And that's how he makes her come for the first time, his gaze locked with hers, one hand muffling her frantic cries, the other stroking and circling. And because he's Cullen, and he's dedicated, he waits until the tremors have almost faded before working one broad finger into the tightness of her body and driving her toward the edge again.

She shatters with his whispered encouragement washing over her, tender lewdness about sweet the hot grip of her cunt is, and how beautiful she is when she's lost in bliss. She's limp and floating, her mind quiet for the first time in days, and it's so lovely to just _be_ that she's not prepared for the door to buck against her back.

Cullen's hand over her mouth keeps her from giving away their precarious position with a startled shriek. "Just a moment," he calls, holding the door shut as he gently eases his fingers away from her. "I think it's stuck."

From the other side, Josephine mutters about unreliable workers and prioritizing upgrades, and Cullen rubs a thumb across her lips before jerking his head toward the table, silently urging her to take her place. So she does, still feeling flushed and unsteady, but sated, too. Renewed. Maybe a little invincible.

Five minutes isn't enough, but five minutes of Cullen is better than a day with anyone else.

* * *

Unfortunately, stolen moments are all they have for a while.

Not that Cullen doesn't make the most of them. He's almost feverishly focused on her whenever they find themselves alone, and he shuts down attempts at reciprocity with a swiftness that's as confusing as it is arousing.

And it _is_ arousing. It can't be anything else, even though she knows it's probably not healthy. She starts to suspect he's distracting himself as much as he's distracting her, exerting iron-fisted control over her responses as an excuse to deny his own.

From what, she doesn't know. But she doesn't ask, because she doesn't tell him why she allows it, either. That every battle, every mission, every _day_ is whittling away at the pieces of her that aren't about leadership and action and coldly pragmatic decisions.

Evelyn is slipping away from herself. _Inquisitor_ isn't a title she wears awkwardly anymore. The first time she sits in judgment, she doesn't even feel conflicted. Hard decisions have become easier. Truth seems starker. Some days she can't even find the softer parts of herself. She's being forged into a weapon, a blade with brutally sharp edges capable of slicing anyone who tries to touch her.

Except him. He knows how to hold her. How to hold her down. The day he corners her in her secret library and drags the clothes from her body is the first time she's felt innocent in longer than she can remember, and she needs that more than she needs anything—the reminder that she's not hardened and cynical and jaded.

He pushes her into her chair and spreads her thighs wide. _Too_ wide—she's never been exposed like this before, and it feels more vulnerable because he's still fully clothed. She tries to bring her knees back together, but he stops her with two strong hands. "Trust me."

It's their ritual. Their code. He demands it every time, as if he still can't believe she offers it, and that's why she does. But this time it's harder. She's flushed and uncertain, her breaths coming in quick pants as she fights the instinct to hide, to cover herself.

He's gentle. Inexorable. He coaxes her legs farther apart this time, and up, hooking her knees over the arms of the chair. His thumbs make slow, soothing circles as they work up the insides of her thighs, quieting her trembles with soft touches and the promise of pleasure.

Her eyes start to drift shut, and he squeezes her legs in warning. "Watch me, Evelyn."

She does, for as long as she can. Not that that's long. Her head's spinning by the time he strokes her with his thumbs, and even being petted and parted is tame compared to the first swipe of his tongue.

He takes her like that. With his mouth and his fingers, and if she could remember any of Sera's mysterious gestures, maybe they'd match up with this moment. But the performance with the peach had been utterly inadequate preparation for the way he can make her writhe with his tongue and then his lips and then all of them together.

She comes so hard her mind skids into mist. And there is nothing to hold on to, nothing to grasp. Especially when his fingers twist inside her, searching, rubbing, and then _finding_. She jerks like she's been electrocuted, and power sparks in her fingertips, beyond her control for the first time.

He sucks her clit between his lips, and she screams at how good it feels. Everything tenses at once, her muscles, her body, her _being_ , and then release floods her, swiping the rest of it away in warmth and relief.

Not just an orgasm, she realizes when the world stops twirling. She's covered half the library in ice, and fear hitches in her chest as she scrambles to bring her knees together. "I'm sorry, I didn't—" _Didn't mean to_.

She's _never_ been naïve enough to say something like that to a templar.

But Cullen covers her knees with two big hands and makes a soothing noise. "I knew what I was doing. I could have stopped you. I would have. You don't have to be afraid with me."

She doesn't know how to tell him that he's the only person she's afraid with now, because he's the only one who still sees her. If she drives him away, Evelyn might disappear completely, swallowed by the Inquisitor and her duty and her hard, hard choices.

Maybe she doesn't have all the power after all.

 


	6. in lies and shattered faith

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He's not in control. She can feel it in the way his fingers bite into her skin, too mean to be on purpose. Usually when he handles her roughly it's with precise intent, giving just enough pain to accentuate the way he's touching her.
> 
> This isn't a man trying to give. This is a man trying to stop himself from taking.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We are wandering farther and farther off the actual game arc into the AU weeds. Follow if you dare.

People have been dying in her name all along, but Stroud is the first one to die at her side, by her command.

She stumbles out of the Fade with the taste of defeat like poison on her tongue. Worse is the shame, because the choice was hers, and when she made it she was already giving up. Hawke had to get back in one piece, because Evelyn is what she's feared all along—a fool who won't stop believing she's special.

Let Hawke believe it for a while. At least she's already a legend.

But Hawke shrugs off the truth with an ease that explains her close friendship with Varric. "Let them have their story," she advises. _Tell them whatever they need to believe so they'll fling themselves on enemy swords_ , is what she means, proving she can be as coldly pragmatic as Leliana at her most ruthless.

Ruthless or not, it's the truth. The people following the Inquisition will fight and bleed either way, but lies will give them faith, and faith will give them hope.

Hope will make them fight harder, and that's Evelyn's job. Inspiring sacrifice.

So she makes herself harder. She makes herself the Hearald, sent from the Fade by Andraste herself to lead them to victory, and empty promises spill from her lips about the rewards that await their fallen. The soldiers cheer, belief shining from their eyes, and Evelyn wonders if it's always this easy to manipulate the faithful, or if she's special after all.

* * *

She still feels dirty inside when Cullen reaches for her. They're in his quarters this time, with the doors locked and Evelyn's back against the wall. His gaze has followed her since she returned to Skyhold, feverish and intense, and she knows he's imagining her washed away in the Fade, lost forever.

His hands are rougher than usual, eager to get beneath the layers keeping him from her skin, because she didn't make it easy for him. She can't tolerate the thought of stripping away her armor and leaving herself vulnerable. She has to be hard right now. Hard, hard, hard, and ruthless, and cold and _not Evelyn._

So she shoves his hands aside so she can work at _his_ armor. He shuts her down—he always shuts her down—his fingers steel bands around her wrists as he guides them up above her head. He's strong, so strong, but she's not the soft, sheltered mage who started this journey.

He expects willing obedience. It's what she's given him every time before, so he's not prepared for her to buck up from the wall and break his grip. Surprise flashes through his eyes, and it's all she sees before she spins them and crashes _him_ back against the wall.

"Let me," she demands, reaching for him again. She doesn't even need to get him naked. Just free his cock, and she'll go down on her knees for him. Let _him_ be the one stripped bare, the one falling to pieces.

Besides, it appeals to the broken pieces of her newly cynical heart. They can force her to be a symbol, their token of faith, but when she prays it will be like this. On her knees in the darkness, whispering her benedictions before he silences her by filling her mouth and utterly defiling her.

"No," he grates, catching her hands. "I can't—this isn't—"

He's not in control. She can feel it in the way his fingers bite into her skin, too mean to be on purpose. Usually when he handles her roughly it's with precise intent, giving just enough pain to accentuate the way he's touching her.

This isn't a man trying to give. This is a man trying to stop himself from taking.

She slides her hand lower, gripping the hard proof of how badly he needs this. She's never taken a man into her mouth, but it's haunted her dreams since he got on his knees in the library. "It doesn't always have to be about my pleasure."

His hips jerk, driving him hard against her palm, making his harsh words a lie. "It does. For now."

" _Why_?"

A muscle in his jaw clenches, making his expression seem as hard as her heart. He closes his fingers around her wrist and drags her hand away with a firmness that feels like _the end_.

And then he tells her.

* * *

The box sits between them on his desk, open and sinister in spite of the beauty of its craftsmanship. Lyrium. The drug that gives Cullen his powers, that makes him—made him—a templar.

He's not taking it.

Her stomach twists as she tries to imagine the pain he's suffered. Is _still_ suffering. The wild-eyes grasp for total control makes a cruel kind of sense now. The tiniest slip could send him tumbling back into addiction. He'd have to start the fight from the beginning. So many things can go wrong—paranoia, madness, obsession…

That makes her stomach lurch in a different way. Maybe that's all she is. A withdrawal-fueled obsession, a new addiction. He _has_ been obsessed. Fixated on possessing her, touching her. Tasting her—

Her stomach doesn't lurch this time. It sinks straight through her feet as the memory rushes back. Cullen on his knees, oblivious to the ice she'd unwittingly created, promising her had the will to stop her, the _power_ to stop her.

Maybe he still does. But it's not the same, and it won't last. And he's been provoking her, driving her out of her head and risking his own life in the face of her steadily growing powers. Risking everything for…what?

A distraction? A game?

If that's true, maybe he's already a little mad.

Oh, but he's being so reasonable now that he's finally confessed. Talking about what this means for the Inquisition, what it means to Cassandra, what it means for the soldiers and their mission, what it means for everyone but him. And her.

But when he meets her eyes, she knows that the words don't matter. The words are a cover, just like before. A shield for the things they can't say, and she knows him well enough by now to see beneath his strength and confidence.

A weak, cowardly part of Cullen is hoping she'll tell him to stop trying. Oh, he'd hate her for it in the end. And maybe that's part of the appeal—letting someone else take the blame for what he suspects he must do.

A weak, cowardly part of her own heart wants it anyway.

She wants him strong and whole. She wants him sane. But more than that, she wants him powerful enough to crush her magic beneath his heel. Because the harder she gets, the more she wonders if some day she'll be the monster, and Varric will be helping some new hero defeat her.

If Cullen hates her before that happens, all the better.

* * *

In the end, she closes the box and pushes it aside. For him, because he deserves more than to live out the misery of her worst fears. And he cups her face between his hands as if she's precious and wonderful, and maybe—maybe—it's not a lie.

"It could be dangerous," he murmurs against her forehead. "On bad days…I don't always trust myself. I don't trust myself with you."

"I do," she replies, the first truth to leave her lips since her faith broke.

But truths mean nothing if you won't commit to them. So she gives him what he needs, lets him strip away her armor. The Inquisitor falls away, followed by the Herald, and even the Mage, leaving just Evelyn. She's still so raw, so _wounded,_ but it only seems to steady him.

It's a little twisted, the way her vulnerability gives him strength. As if he needs a selfless reason to fight the call of the lyrium, a greater purpose for his maintained control. Everything about this is twisted, especially the way he makes her come. Against his desk, his chest flush against her back and his fingers between her thighs while her hands scramble for purchase.

Her fingers knock into the wooden box, and it's fitting. His old addiction and his new one, both of them greedy, both of them taking so much from him, and through the fog of pleasure she makes herself a promise—

The next time his hands find her skin, it won't be about her pleasure.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you, thank you for the comments. I'm behind in replying because CHRISTMAS, but you all are making me so excited to finish. I may just go write the next chapter now, because. You know. FINALLY. :D


	7. for the light in darkness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That's what Cullen is, when you strip away all the layers of hurt and disappointment—a would-be hero who's always been in the wrong place at the wrong time. He has so much to give, and no one's ever seen him clearly enough to take it.

It's not until they're dancing that she realizes this is the first time she's touched Cullen in public.

The well-bred ladies of Orlais are crushed. It makes Evelyn smile in a way she thought she'd forgotten, and her lips ache with it as Cullen tries to guide her with the big hand resting on her hip. He's right—he's a passable dancer at best, too stiff and focused, too obviously counting in his head.

Noticing surprises her. It's a memory from a different life. A soft life of faith and surety, a life when people other than Blackwall called her _my lady_.

If Cullen's throng of admirers had gotten this chance, they wouldn't be mentally critiquing his dancing. They'd be plotting how to entrap him with wiles and subtlety, because all court life is like that, but never so much as here.

Evelyn is no better. Oh, the invitation she issues is blunter, but her layered motives are worthy of the Winter Palace. "Come to my quarters when we're back at Skyhold."

Anticipation heats his eyes. No doubt he's imagining what he could do to her with a bed and a whole night. Perhaps it's unfair, but she lowers her lashes and gives him the soft, shy smile that makes him wild. "Or I could come to yours."

Oh, he likes that even more. She knew he would. His fingers flex, and he nods, just nods, as if he can't even speak without revealing too much. He can't resist the idea of her, in his bed. At his mercy.

Neither can she. Because this time, there will be no mercy. She'll make sure of it.

* * *

_When we're back_ turns into _three days later_ , and when she comes to Cullen's quarters he's not waiting for her with heat and hunger in his eyes. The need and longing twisting his features is reserved for the lyrium.

He doesn't even see her. His fists rest on the desk the way they so often do on the war table, but his arms shake with tension, as if he's moments from punching through the wood. In a blur one hand shoots out to snatch up the wooden box.

It crashes into the wall at her side, and _that's_ when he notices her. One addiction standing in the shards of another, and she's not sure he can separate them in his mind in that first moment. The things he hates. The things he wants. The things he needs.

She could be all of them at once. Maybe she already is.

It vanishes in the next heartbeat, and he's begging forgiveness. She can tell he wants her to leave, to let him have his moment of shattered control without witnesses. But it's pain carving lines around his eyes now, so much pain.

So she closes the door. Bolts it. And makes him talk.

* * *

It comes out in bits and pieces, and it makes her own secret scars seem childish and shallow. The templars had come for her with swords, but the mages came for him with blood magic. The truth he bites out is worse and darker than the stories they tell about him, steeped in loss and torment and reckless, ridiculous faith.

The harder they hit him, the more they _hurt_ him, the more of himself he gives. And he never seems to doubt that there's a purpose. That the Maker has a plan, that Andraste will guide him, that he can do good in a world where good people die faster and harder and crueler.

Even now, it's all he can think about—how much more he can give. He's working himself up to taking the lyrium again, and she was wrong before. It's not weakness at all. It's strength, and courage, and terrifying, awe-inspiring faith.

Someone should reward him for it, and she doesn't trust the Maker as much as he does.

Reaching up to cup his face, she shakes her head. "No, Cullen. You _will not_ take it."

Relief floods his eyes. He rests his forehead against hers, and she holds him as pain shudders through him. Then she coaxes him up to his bed and sets to work on his clothes.

"Evelyn—"

"Shhh." It's not fair that he can get her out of her armor so quickly, and she's still so unfamiliar with his. She fumbles a little, but this is the lowest stakes puzzle she's had to decipher in months, with the best reward at the end of it.

He tries again when she bares his chest. "I really should—"

"Rest," she interrupts, resisting the temptation to explore the flexing muscles and scarred skin. He's worn and exhausted, and clearly in pain. The withdrawal is riding him hard. Now that she knows what to look for, the signs are all too familiar. He looked like this every time he came to her, feverish and grasping for reassurance that his willpower was unwavering.

It is, but she can help him find another way to prove it.

His fingers touch her cheek, slide to cup her jaw. He presses his thumb to the corner of her mouth. "You have so many burdens. I can't be worth adding to them."

It's the most heartbreaking confession he's made, and there's something broken in a world where a man who gives this much can say those words. "You're worth more," she says firmly, urging him toward the bed. "But you'll never be a burden."

He doesn't believe it. Not even when she's curled around him, holding him while his body shakes. He mutters a warning about nightmares, about not trusting himself with her so close, and her chest aches with a feeling that doesn't belong in a ruthless leader.

She's falling in love. With a templar. It really is the end of the world.

* * *

Cullen wasn't lying about the nightmares.

Movement jerks her from a sound sleep, but she's groggy and she trusts him, which means he's on her before she's alert enough to struggle. He's big and half naked and has her pinned on her stomach with one arm twisted up behind her back while she's still trying to catch her breath, which is a lot harder with his body crushing her into the bed.

They freeze like that for one heartbeat, and then another. Long enough for Evelyn to realize that he's hard and grinding against her ass, which makes her wonder if this was a nightmare at all, or if this is just how Cullen wakes up—primed to defend himself.

"Evelyn?" His voice is rusty, horrified, and then he's rolling away and to his feet so fast she feels weightless, like she'll float up off the bed now that he's not there to hold her down. "Maker's breath, I'm sorry."

"Don't." She swings her legs over the side of the bed but doesn't rise. It's still night, still dark. When she tilts her head back, he's a vague shape hovering over her, his strong body clearly visible, his face shrouded in shadows. "If I wanted to stop you, I could."

It's as close as she's come to mentioning what else he's giving up with the lyrium, and he clears his throat. "Yes, well, it's not just—I mean—"

He breaks off and moves away. Fire flares, and he returns with a candle, setting it close enough that the warm spill of light reveals the embarrassment in his face—and the intensity of his arousal. And she's a fool for not seeing it until now, but maybe it would have been impossible before she understood his past and his faith.

Cullen is confident—cocky even—when it comes to giving her pleasure. But everything in him is tangled up in how much more he can give. Does he even know how to take?

Not selfishly. But selflessly… yes, she can use this. His gaze is roaming her face, and it's not so hard to force herself to blush—the things she's about to say warrant it in any case. "I wasn't thinking about stopping you. I was thinking…"

The wrongness of it helps her. So does the fact that it's the truth. Her cheeks flame and she looks away, and that's all it takes for her noble templar to come to her rescue. His fingertips touch her chin, tilting her face back to his. "You can tell me."

Yes, that's the flaw in the plan. That she'll actually have to tell him. There's always the chance that instead of heating, his eyes will go blank with disgust and she'll have to flee and never look at him again. "I like it when you make me feel things. I just wish…you'd make me do things, too."

His eyes go blank, and some part of her is already dying when he squeezes his eyes shut and groans. "Don't tempt me, Evelyn. The things I would make you do…"

"Yes," she whispers, swaying forward until she's whispering the words against the bare skin of his stomach. "You can't scare me."

"You can't know that."

She slips from the bed in response, to her knees. For the first time in forever, there's so little separating her from the hot length of him, but she takes her time freeing his cock. Time for him to tell her to stop or to swat her hands away like he's done every other time.

Instead, he sinks one hand into her hair and holds her gaze. "I don't know if I'll be able to hold back."

"Don't try," she whispers, and parts her lips to claim him.

* * *

Of course she's awkward. She doesn't know what she's doing, though Cullen's noises lead her well enough until his control snaps. And at first she can't tell the difference—he's still a little rough, a little possessive, and so very intense—but it's the _words_ that send her spinning.

 _That's right_ and _so sweet_ and _good girl_ , nothing the Commander would ever say to the Inquisitor as he gripped her hair watched her take his cock into her mouth. Because that's not who they are now. Whatever fantasy he's built around the two of them is illicit, and she doesn't even need to know the details to be there with him, wet and hot and desperate to please him.

Maybe it's the cliché. A stolen moment of forbidden love between a mage and a templar. Or something darker—a Circle mage on her knees, buying his protection or forgiveness with her eager tongue. Evelyn wouldn't judge him for it. She has her own guilty confusion over the hidden corners of her mind. Even with everything she's been through, everything she's seen, her pulse races a little faster when she remembers how he'd slammed her to the bed.

He must see it in her eyes, because he tugs at her hair, guiding her head back. "What are you thinking?"

She licks the taste of him from her lips and strains forward as if she can reach him again when he doesn't want her to. Foolish, because she knows his willpower is endless, but she still likes the way his face slackens when she does it, as if he's never seen anything more amazing than her, eagerly trying to wrap her lips around him again.

 _That's right,_ she thinks at him, saying it with her parted lips and her breathless moan and her eyes. _I want this. I want you._

She knows she's won when he abandons his question unanswered and lets her claim him again. And she would have gladly taken him to the end, but too soon he's pulling back, dragging her up. She starts to protest until she realizes he has a plan.

Her Commander _always_ has a plan.

* * *

The first time they make love is on his desk. "So I'll remember it every day," he whispers as he presses her back to the wood and covers her body with his own. It's a good excuse, but in her heart she thinks he dragged her back down here to erase all the hours he's spent tormenting himself with his box of lyrium.

She doesn't mind. She's so past ready he could have taken her against the wall or on the floor. But he's slow and thorough, working his fingers into her until she's panting and begging around three of them. And then it's just him, thick and wide and pushing so deep. It's been so long since the first time, but even the dull ache doesn't bother her.

Besides, he's already a master of her body. He knows every way to please her, and he uses them all and groans every time she squeezes tight around his cock. She's frantic by the time she rakes her nails down his back and begs him to come with her, because she doesn't want to be too dazed to watch him come apart.

When he does, it's everything she wanted. His eyes close and his brow furrows, and he freezes above her, lips parted on a noise of disbelieving relief. Then he slumps against her chest, and she wraps her arms and legs around him as their hearts pound together.

She doesn't know how they make it back to his bed. Maybe he carries her, because he certainly seems to be bursting with renewed energy. She's half dozing when she feels his erection pressing at her back again, and still a quarter asleep when she rolls to her belly and lifts her hips in sleepy invitation.

He covers her so fast, forcing her thighs wide and catching up her wrists to pin to the bed above her head. "Do you want this?"

His voice is raw. The moment is so fragile. He still wants control, and she doesn't think it's just about needing to believe he has it. He's hungry for what it represents—someone who trusts him, someone he can care for, someone who needs the things he has to offer.

That's what Cullen is, when you strip away all the layers of hurt and disappointment—a would-be hero who's always been in the wrong place at the wrong time. He has so much to give, and no one's ever seen him clearly enough to take it.

Their loss.

"I need you," she whispers. The truth this time, no games. No games ever again. "You bring me back to myself. You keep me from getting too cold."

His hands tighten on her wrists, and he growls against the back of her head. " _This_ , Evelyn. Do you want this?"

She doesn't think it will be sweet this time. If she says _yes_ he'll work himself so deep and make her feel every thrust. He'll shatter her world with pleasure and he'll take his own, and that's the only part that was missing before. She doesn't want to be his distraction or his penance.

She wants to be his.

"Always," she says, and he rewards her by driving so deep she muffles a scream in his pillow. It's so good, so _perfect_. They fit together. Their bodies. Their scars. So many terrible things had to happen to bring them together…

And for a moment, a fraction of a heartbeat, she wonders if that was what the Maker intended all along.

It's a fleeting thought, too fragile to be called a renewal of faith and swallowed by his pounding rhythm as he rides her fast and hard. Then he gets one hand beneath her body, his clever, familiar fingers stroking her to dizzy heights, and she can't think at all. Not until later, far later, when they're a tangle of sweaty limbs and he's already asleep, his body a heavy, wonderful weight against hers.

She's not still falling. She's hit the ground and survived.

Evelyn Trevelyan is desperately in love with a templar, and she's going to save the world for him.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so it ends!
> 
> Thanks for coming on this ride with me. Maybe now that this story is out of my head, I can sleep. :)


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